black
grey
blue
red
brown
white

When composing a verse let there not be a hair’s breath separating your mind from what you write; composition of a poem must be done in an instant, like a woodcutter felling a huge tree or a swordsman leaping at a dangerous enemy.

Matsuo Basho

Winter garden, the moon thinned to a thread, insects singing.
MATSUO BASHO

Insect Old Pond Sing Winter
Why so scrawny, cat? Starving for fat fish or mice… Or backyard love?
MATSUO BASHO

Cat Love Starve
At the ancient pond the frog plunges into the sound of water.
MATSUO BASHO

Pond Sound Water
Traveler’s heart. Never settled long in one place. Like a portable fire.
MATSUO BASHO

Fire Heart Place Travel
Not to think of yourself / as someone who did not count — / Festival of the Souls.
MATSUO BASHO

Count Festival Soul Thinking
With every gust of wind, the butterfly changes its place on the willow.
MATSUO BASHO

Butterfly Change Mindset Place
The haiku that reveals seventy to eighty percent of its subject is good. Those that reveal fifty to sixty percent, we never tire of.
MATSUO BASHO

Goodness Hide Mystery Poem Reveal
The desire to break the silence with constant human noise is, I believe, precisely an avoidance of the sacred terror of that divine encounter.
MATSUO BASHO

Avoid Believe Break Desire Divine Human Myself Noise Silence Sound
I felt quite at home, / As if it were mine sleeping lazily / In this house of fresh air.
MATSUO BASHO

Air Home Quite Sleep
Year by year, the monkey’s mask reveals the monkey.
MATSUO BASHO

Animal Character Deep Face Reveal
The temple bell stops but I still hear the sound coming out of the flowers.
MATSUO BASHO

Flower Myself Sound Stop Temple
Sitting quietly, doing nothing, Spring comes, and the grass grows, by itself.
MATSUO BASHO

Growth Nature Quiet Spring
Breaking the silence Of an ancient pond, A frog jumped into water – A deep resonance.
MATSUO BASHO

Break Deep Frog Resonate Silence Water
First snow-falling-on the half-finished bridge.
MATSUO BASHO

Bridge Fall Snow
This autumn- why am I growing old? bird disappearing among clouds.
MATSUO BASHO

Autumn Disappear Growth Myself Old
Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the wise. Seek what they sought.
MATSUO BASHO

Deep Seek Teaching Wisdom

When composing a verse let there not be a hair’s breath separating your mind from what you write; composition of a poem must be done in an instant, like a woodcutter felling a huge tree or a swordsman leaping at a dangerous enemy.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

When composing a verse let there not be a hair’s breath separating your mind from what you write; composition of a poem must be done in an instant, like a woodcutter felling a huge tree or a swordsman leaping at a dangerous enemy.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More Matsuo Basho Quotes